Tech talent shortage is real. We can't find anyone worth interviewing right now, as a 5 person startup. (And no, we aren't age discriminating)
And lets be honest, looking at most job postings, most people have absolute ridiculous expectations of candidates. Most things you can and should be able to train to some extent on the job.
You're reading too much into those requirements. Nice-to-haves are not must-haves. I've been involved in hiring processes for a front-end position that listed non-trivial experience with React and among the half dozen candidates who applied the company even considered a high-schools dropout who only had to show a 50-hour HTML online course.
That would be the case if we had too many applicants! It seems we need to use a recruiter or something, everyone here seems to think its ridiculous that we can't find people.
All of these things matter more the older you get since older engineers tend to already have a home and don't want to move to California, have a more involved personal life, and expect things like medical benefits. You might be discriminating on age without consciously knowing it.
Once you start interviewing people, you will realize how utterly incompetent most of them are. I am talking about people with multiple years of full-time experience in the field and a relevant degree who cannot even implement a basic FizzBuzz. And I am not exaggerating it for comedic value, I legitimately met many people like that by now. Prior to seeing this myself, I could've sworn this was just a joke people used to describe incompetent people, but this is real. And being able to pass FizzBuzz doesn't even scratch the surface of being competent, but a lot of people cannot manage to get past that stage.
People with experience have more dignity than to perform a dog-and-pony show for some startup on a whiteboard. Remember, in this market you need them more than they need you.
Every single engineer who was or is employed at any big tech company has went through whiteboard interviews. If you are trying to imply that big tech companies cannot manage to attract experienced people, then I question the validity of that.
Have you considered the possibility that you're asking the wrong questions? Or perhaps your organization isn't good at identifying candidates with low skills but high potential?
Why waste time interviewing incompetent people?
Just ask for code samples (github, stackoverflow, anything else) and make a 5-minute screening call via Skype to filter out incompetent people.
I'm sure all of them can implement FizzBuzz, just not on the interview under pressure. It has absolutely nothing to do with competence, but understanding that requires just a little bit of background in human psychology.
Sorry for the snarky tone, but it should be evident by now that the real shortage is for "highly talented souls willing to work for peanuts"--which is kind of oxymoronic. People want to hire "highly talented" and smart individuals, but expect them to be dumb enough to sell themselves short?
The startup offers I've seen in the bay area for SWE a couple years out of school are pretty high, $150k - $185k which is pretty good cash comp from a startup.
Higher than that is probably not a realistic expectation for most startups that are not flush with cash. They'd probably be happy to pay it or more for John Carmack, but you're probably not John Carmack.
For the same reason it's easier to hire an actor in LA.
I agree that is pretty good for a Bay Area startup, but it is far below the total compensation a FAANG company offers today.
After several years, the RSUs at a FAANG could pay out more every year than the salary, and they are immediately sellable on the open market. Startup options are likely to be worthless.
This is why startups have a hard time hiring. A lot of engineers would rather work for FAANG or similar large companies, where they will make a lot more money with much less risk.
OP seemed to suggest that startups have trouble hiring because they don't pay enough and I think that's not entirely true from what I've seen. They don't pay more than FAANG which is expected, but they're not underpaying for that trade-off.
I do agree though that FAANG salaries have gotten extreme so it's a harder opportunity cost than it used to be. If you can swing $350k at Netflix or $200-400k+ total comp at the others and you work there for 5-10 years that's basically a small startup exit. I think it used to be less dramatic.
I think the misery of the technical interview process is actually the thing that limits mobility most. Some of my extremely capable friends (that do work at FAANGs) don't optimize on moving around or income as much as they could because the process is so painful and anxiety inducing.
> Higher than that is probably not a realistic expectation for most startups that are not flush with cash.
Then isn't this an admission that there is no talent shortage? Again, that just means there is a shortage of talents who are willing to take the offer and work for $150k.
If you imagine there is only one employable tech worker, it'd be strange to claim that there is no shortage because you can hire away the one worker for a 20million dollar salary (or whatever the highest salary is to outbid all of the others).
Not everyone is good at being an investor, but it's not entirely luck, there is skill in determining what companies are good and what companies are not.
> We can't find anyone worth interviewing right now
How can both statements be simultaneously true.
Why not post a link to your job?
1: The definition also includes the fact that employers are more reluctant to lower wages than they are to increase them, all else equal.
1. Increasing wages.
2. Increasing benefits. (More vacation time, paying for employee education, shorter work-weeks.)
3. Lowering the hiring bar, and spending more effort on mentoring and educating new employees.
4. Hiring remotely.
These all, of course, come with costs, and trade-offs.
If you don't mind me asking, are you looking for FAANG-level talent? If so, are you paying FAANG-level wages, or providing MicroFaceGoog[1]-level work-life balance?
[1] Yes, there are obviously teams at all of those companies that work on death march schedules. They are, generally speaking, the exception.
In this industry there seems to be no place for someone experienced who thinks that working 50-60 hours a week is bullshit, and would like to work half that. That tells me there's no "talent" shortage, since the employers aren't flexible at all when it comes to working part time and receiving proportionally lower pay. The moment you ask to work less than 40 hours a week the employer immediately assumes that either there's something wrong with you or you're willing to work for peanuts.
If you are willing to deal with a bit of hassle, hire Canadians. Same timezones, same CS educations, same language, probably a little cheaper (sorry, fellow Canadians), lots of interest in US startups.
There is enough research in job markets showing that companies get more picky and advertise more demanding and complicated job requirements as more candidates are available. So your claim is empty, since this is how companies behave regardless of supply. And if you were to measure it, how big artificial barriers or filters are for someone to get hired could be the measure of oversupply, not shortage. With shortage there would be no barriers, everyone applying would be interviewed and likely hired. But given current hazing hours long interview practices it's pretty clear that companies are drowning in oversupply.
I'm not. I'm an engineer on the team and I wrote my comment (passive-aggressively) because my workload is ridiculous. As I understand it, we're having a very difficult time finding people.
Another possibility is that they don't have enough money to hire another developer, but don't want to admit it to you. Start-up life can be harsh.
Don't burn yourself out. I can tell you from experience that it gets harder and harder to come back from burnout each time it happens. If your workload is ridiculous, it may be talk to your boss about adjusting timelines/expectations to something more realistic, or even time to start looking for another job.
You are posting in probably one of the most fertile places to find talent...and there is no link in your bio to your company or personal email.
No wonder why you can't find talent.
Generally I’ve just gone by industry reputation, for where to go. But I wonder if there are any hidden gems out there.
Companies in the US don't advertise pay ranges, but they are easily Google-able, people have friends, Glassdoor is a thing, etc.
A junior at Facebook will make ~160k/year, someone good with ~5 years experience (at FB) will make ~300k/year.
Most startups want to hire the latter person for the salary of the former, while getting them to work harder, for fewer benefits, and fewer vacation days, all in exchange for...
An equity carrot, that has a 1/500 chance of materializing into anything more than lunch money?
A chance to 'change the world' - as if writing an app for ordering dogsitters on demand is the moral equal to providing clean drinking water to poor villages - or curing cancer.
A chance to be a big fish in a tiny pond? You'll still probably be second fiddle to the CTO, and employees 2 through 5...
Meh, glassdoor is off by a factor of 3x when checking in with a few of the companies I just interviewed with. They seem to require an account, but it’s similar to reports like this which are comically wrong:
https://www.indeed.com/salaries/Software-Engineer-Salaries-a...
Sure, you can reach through your network, but price discovery seems pretty bad if you have to do word of mouth.
shortage is real. We can't find anyone worth interviewing
Perhaps a mention of your specialty and location is in order. Your HN public profile is blank.